Train slipping periodically

[AdamWatchesWatches]

Hi everyone

I just started with this hobby so bear with me if I'm asking something obvious. I'm overhauling an old orvin diver with an AS 1904 movement in it. Last night I finished rebuilding it and was putting it in beat when I noticed the center wheel would spin freely and then catch again when I was changing positions. The gears are in good condition as are the pallet stones, but I noticed that the escape wheel looked like it was sitting very low relative to the other wheels and it looks like it's contacting the lower half of the pallet stones. I attached the best picture I could get with my phone camera... I can't feel the post of the escape wheel protruding from the jewel at on the bridge, but I can see it. Is there a way to raise the setting so that the escape wheel pinion meshes better with the center wheel?

Thanks for your thoughts. I also attached a picture of the dial for some kicks.

Adam

[JohnR725]

12 hours ago, AdamWatchesWatches said:

but I noticed that the escape wheel looked like it was sitting very low relative to the other wheels and it looks like it's contacting the lower half of the pallet stones.

if I look at your picture it looks to me like to escape wheel is way too far down because the upper pivot is visible. It should be farther up in the jewel. if you did a escape wheel end shake testing in other words you attempted to move your escape wheel up and down I have a suspicion you going to find it has a heck of a lot of play.

12 hours ago, AdamWatchesWatches said:

Is there a way to raise the setting so that the escape wheel pinion meshes better with the center wheel?

unfortunately to get a proper assessment you're going to have to take the watch a part. then you can look up the lower jewel properly and see if it looks like it's been knocked out of alignment. 

then an unfortunate problem of watch repair is the initial investment in tools and things is relatively inexpensive. But you do end up needing special the tools conceivably an infinite quantity of them that none of us can afford. So yes they do make tools to relocate the jewel if it's just been pushed down and it's not broken or something else.

 

[Neverenoughwatches]

17 hours ago, AdamWatchesWatches said:

Is there a way to raise the setting so that the escape wheel pinion meshes better with the center wheel?

 

I'm thinking you have something in the wrong way Adam. As you say the escape wheel pinion is not meshing with the center wheel as i can see on your picture. I cant comment specifically on this calibre but generally the train procession is Barrel ( great wheel or 1st wheel ), 2nd wheel ( center wheel ), 3rd wheel, 4th wheel, 5th wheel ( escape wheel ). So in saying this the escape wheel maybe should not be meshing with the center wheel and should be driven by the forth wheel. The escape wheel pinion looks extremely worn on its  bottom half which is probably where it was actually been driven initially. Unless this  escape wheel does not belong in this  watch at all.

[Shane]

I had a similar problem with a watch that someone previously, left a capstone out.  It and it's screw where not found rattling around in the movement or case.  Not sure if it ran that way or for how long but if it did and I had put the wheels under a microscope, I would have  probably seen some unusual wear that would have required a professional to replace them.  I added a used  capstone and it ran fine.  It was a different movement but something to look for.

Shane 

[AdamWatchesWatches]

Sorry for the late reply guys and thank you for the advice. 

On 9/19/2022 at 9:45 AM, Neverenoughwatches said:

I'm thinking you have something in the wrong way Adam. As you say the escape wheel pinion is not meshing with the center wheel as i can see on your picture. I cant comment specifically on this calibre but generally the train procession is Barrel ( great wheel or 1st wheel ), 2nd wheel ( center wheel ), 3rd wheel, 4th wheel, 5th wheel ( escape wheel ).

I currently have the watch completely assembled and put it in beat. Would that be possible if I messed up the assembly of the train? I'll check my reference pictures again this weekend and see if anything is wrong.

 

On 9/19/2022 at 3:51 AM, JohnR725 said:

if I look at your picture it looks to me like to escape wheel is way too far down because the upper pivot is visible. It should be farther up in the jewel. if you did a escape wheel end shake testing in other words you attempted to move your escape wheel up and down I have a suspicion you going to find it has a heck of a lot of play.

unfortunately to get a proper assessment you're going to have to take the watch a part. then you can look up the lower jewel properly and see if it looks like it's been knocked out of alignment. 

then an unfortunate problem of watch repair is the initial investment in tools and things is relatively inexpensive. But you do end up needing special the tools conceivably an infinite quantity of them that none of us can afford. So yes they do make tools to relocate the jewel if it's just been pushed down and it's not broken or something else.

 

Thanks John. It's funny, I have read through 2 watchmaking texts and neither really mentions endshake testing and correcting. I plan to take the movement apart again this weekend and see if there's anything with the jewel/setting.

 

On 9/20/2022 at 5:29 AM, Shane said:

I had a similar problem with a watch that someone previously, left a capstone out.  It and it's screw where not found rattling around in the movement or case.

Interesting I'll be sure to do a thorough check. To make sure all the jewels are intact and present!

[Neverenoughwatches]

6 hours ago, AdamWatchesWatches said:

currently have the watch completely assembled and put it in beat. Would that be possible if I messed up the assembly of the train? I'll check my reference pictures again this weekend and see if anything is wrong.

 

The train assembly and escapement could be considered as 2 seperate sections of a movement connected by the pallets and pallet fork. The train to transmit power to the escapement to be released and then regulated by the balance assembly, but also to provide a visual representation of the time that the movement keeps by use of the watch hands. I wouldnt have expected that full assembly would have been possible if the train wheels and their orientation wasnt correct, but that is on the assumption that the train wheels are the correct train wheels for that movement. I dont think that having it in beat is relavent unless the movement is actually running and keeping time. Just one question  to add, does the escape wheel connect to both the center wheel and the forth wheel ?

Edited September 24, 2022 by Neverenoughwatches

[AdamWatchesWatches]

18 hours ago, Neverenoughwatches said:

does the escape wheel connect to both the center wheel and the forth wheel ?

No, just the center wheel. I erroneously said in beat when I meant that the watch was running +2 dial down and -4 crown down. It's possible that there's some incorrect wheels in the movement, or that the escape wheel is worn down passed the point of usefulness. I removed the top cap jewel assembly of the escape wheel and everything looks fine.

There's too much endshake for a jewel position to be the only problem. I could almost remove the escape wheel from it's position when I was checking endshake before disassembling.

Maybe I'll look for some wheels or even another of the same movement and compare parts.

Edited September 25, 2022 by AdamWatchesWatches

[JohnR725]

On 9/23/2022 at 8:53 PM, AdamWatchesWatches said:

Thanks John. It's funny, I have read through 2 watchmaking texts and neither really mentions endshake testing and correcting. I plan to take the movement apart again this weekend and see if there's anything with the jewel/setting.

it probably depends upon the background of whoever wrote the book. If you've ever met anybody influenced by modern watch repair training there very obsessed with checking end shake. Rolex actually specifies how much end shake all the wheels in the watch have to have.

but there's a big difference between making sure the end shake is correct for Rolex watch versus having your escape wheel end up either under the pallet fork spinning uncontrolled or perhaps not meshing with the fourth wheel.

On 9/19/2022 at 9:45 AM, Neverenoughwatches said:

I'm thinking you have something in the wrong way Adam. As you say the escape wheel pinion is not meshing with the center wheel as i can see on your picture.

it's hard to tell in the picture it's kind of an optical illusion the escape wheel never meshes with the center wheel but looking at the picture again it does look like the wheel it meshes with its down a little too low. Hard to tell in the picture it be better if wit a picture with the main plate off so we can see how the wheels all the wine.

On 9/18/2022 at 3:30 PM, AdamWatchesWatches said:

AS 1904 movement

sometimes it's nice to have other pictures like here's a picture where we can look down at things. here we can see because it's a sweep second which makes things more complicated sweep second wheel which I'm assuming is the fourth wheel but not necessarily notice that it meshes with the escape wheel so the optical illusion of it being the center wheel is really least sweep wheel/fourth wheel

http://www.ranfft.de/cgi-bin/bidfun-db.cgi?10&ranfft&0&2uswk&AS_1904

but does bring up an interesting question from that picture

On 9/20/2022 at 5:29 AM, Shane said:

I had a similar problem with a watch that someone previously, left a capstone out. 

looking at the picture at the link above there is definitely an end stone on the top and we can't see the dial side on this watch but there's probably one of their. We can also see the jewel count is 21 so extra jewel sprinkled here and there

basically we need better pictures of the watch in this discussion.

then I suppose it would be nice if we used proper terminology. Unfortunately were never going to find a service manual for watch like this but you can get a parts list. so part number 227 is the sweep wheel there is no fourth wheel in this watch but it's basically in the place or what we would think of as a fourth wheel. Then it still slightly misleading in the picture as to whether the escape wheel is low enough down that the  pinion made no longer be engaging the sweep wheel. So basically somebody has to take the watch apart to figure out why their escape wheel is not supposed to be.

2508_AS 1904,1914.pdf

[Neverenoughwatches]

4 hours ago, AdamWatchesWatches said:

No, just the center wheel. I erroneously said in beat when I meant that the watch was running +2 dial down and -4 crown down.

If this is the case then something is wrong Adam. As in my first post the escape wheel is the last in the train procession and the center wheel is the second hence why it is sometimes confused with the second hand wheel . These 2 wheels should not be in connection with each other, it could be that your escape wheel is not from this movement. The escape wheels pinion looks very worn on the bottom. I am surprised that the movement runs if they are connecting.

4 hours ago, AdamWatchesWatches said:

No, just the center wheel. I erroneously said in beat when I meant that the watch was running +2 dial down and -4 crown down. It's possible that there's some incorrect wheels in the movement, or that the escape wheel is worn down passed the point of usefulness. I removed the top cap jewel assembly of the escape wheel and everything looks fine.

There's too much endshake for a jewel position to be the only problem. I could almost remove the escape wheel from it's position when I was checking endshake before disassembling.

Maybe I'll look for some wheels or even another of the same movement and compare parts.

As john has said a good clear plan view of the movement may help identify the issue. When the watch is in beat, this has to do with the amount of time that the balance wheel swings from the pallet fork center to its point of returning back and  into the pallet fork again, and then out and off on its opposite directional swing. These 2 opposite outward swinging directions from the pallet fork and back to it should take the same amount of time. When this happens the movement is in beat. When the time is different then the watch is out of beat and has a beat time error measured in milliseconds .

[JohnR725]

11 hours ago, AdamWatchesWatches said:

No, just the center wheel. I erroneously said in beat when I meant that the watch was running +2 dial down and -4 crown down. It's possible that there's some incorrect wheels in the movement, or that the escape wheel is worn down passed the point of usefulness. I removed the top cap jewel assembly of the escape wheel and everything looks fine.

 

7 hours ago, Neverenoughwatches said:

If this is the case then something is wrong Adam.

I really need to improve my reading skills yes I saw the statement but mentally it wasn't sinking in. as  Neverenoughwatches is pointing out if your escape wheel is meshing with the center will you have a problem.

then I will make some assumptions like for instance  AdamWatchesWatches is new to the discussion group and we didn't even get an introduction so we don't know your background history.  also I'm making the assumption that this is probably your first watch that you repairing. Then unfortunately typically newbies make interesting assumptions because you haven't worked on enough watches to grasp how they work yet. This leads to incorrect assumptions and diagnostics usually.

So for instance let's look at the above quote. We know from your quote that the watch can run and what is running. But you're concerned about incorrect wheels well if you had incorrect wheels your watch would not be running. The wheels are just fine. As far as the escape wheel being worn out to the point of usefulness I don't think I've ever seen that one before and I work on hundred-year-old watches will escape wheels fine except . 

11 hours ago, AdamWatchesWatches said:

There's too much endshake for a jewel position to be the only problem. I could almost remove the escape wheel from it's position when I was checking endshake before disassembling.

usually if you can remove the escape wheel one of the problems would be the lack of pivots. As it appears to be from the picture the movement I found this escape wheel appears to have conical pivots because they have ends stones. This would mean it would be impossible to break the lower pivot off very common for newbies to do that or other things to do that possibly and you now riding on the cone rather than the pivot and the entire escape wheel with drop-down it might even build a run in that position may be we need a decent picture the escape wheel out of the watch a nice side views so we can see the pivots

oh I don't think I asked yet you pick this watch the service because and what was the condition of the watch in was a running before you service did or basically what was the condition of the watch before servicing?

 

[grsnovi]

On 9/24/2022 at 9:49 PM, AdamWatchesWatches said:

There's too much endshake for a jewel position to be the only problem.

Perhaps a combination of broken lower jewel and really worn lower pivot would cause the entire escape wheel to sit too low.

[ManSkirtBrew]

On 10/1/2022 at 4:30 PM, grsnovi said:

Perhaps a combination of broken lower jewel and really worn lower pivot would cause the entire escape wheel to sit too low.

I had a Waltham pocket watch not too long ago where the hole for the lower escape wheel jewel was worn and the jewel had migrated South a few fractions of a mm, causing the pallet stones to jump over the escape wheel's teeth.